The Project Hydro Glossary of Terms and Definitions

To help the Project Hydro community with some common terms you might encounter we have created a glossary of terms and definitions, along with relevant links.

2FA: see Two-Factor Authentication

API: see Application Programming Interface

Application Programming Interface: A set of subroutine definitions, communication protocols, and tools for building software. In general terms, it is a set of clearly defined methods of communication among various components. A good API makes it easier to develop a computer program by providing all the building blocks, which are then put together by the programmer (from Wikipedia)

Authentication: The process or action of proving or showing something to be true, genuine, or valid (from Oxford Dictionaries)

Blockchain: A digital ledger in which transactions made in bitcoin or another cryptocurrency are recorded chronologically and publicly (from Investopedia)

Cryptocurrency: A digital asset designed to work as a medium of exchange that uses strong cryptography to secure financial transactions, control the creation of additional units, and verify the transfer of assets (from Wikipedia)

DA: see Decentralization Ambassador

DAO: See Decentralized Autonomous Organization

dApp: An application run by many users on a decentralized network with trustless protocols (from Wikipedia)

Decentralized Autonomous Organization: A decentralized autonomous organization (DAO) is an organization represented by rules encoded as a computer program that is transparent, controlled by shareholders and not influenced by a central government. A DAO’s financial transaction record and program rules are maintained on a blockchain (from Wikipedia)

Decentralisation: The process by which the activities of an organization, particularly those regarding planning and decision-making, are distributed or delegated away from a central, authoritative location or group (from Wikipedia)

Decentralization Ambassador: An ambassador for the Hydro project whose role is to engage with the community and aid the development of the project (see Medium)

ERC-1484: An identity management and aggregation framework on the Ethereum blockchain (see GitHub)

ERC-20: A technical standard used for smart contracts on the Ethereum blockchain for implementing tokens. ERC stands for Ethereum Request for Comment, and 20 is the number that was assigned to this request (from Wikipedia)

Layer 4: Business platforms that choose to build commercial projects on top of layers 1–3, e.g. The Hydrogen Technology Corporation

Machine Learning: A field of artificial intelligence that uses statistical techniques to give computer systems the ability to “learn” (e.g., progressively improve performance on a specific task) from data, without being explicitly programmed (from Wikipedia)

Snowflake: Phase 2 of the Hydro roadmap: a unique and immutable ‘digital fingerprint’ that is stored on the Hydro blockchain (see the Snowflake developer page)

Tide: Phase 4 of the Hydro roadmap: payments and transactions on the Hydro blockchain (see the Tide developer page)

Two-Factor Authentication: A method of confirming a user’s claimed identity in which a computer user is granted access only after successfully presenting two or more pieces of evidence (or factors) to an authentication mechanism (from Wikipedia)

Tokenization: the process of converting some form of asset into a token that can be moved, recorded, or stored on a blockchain system (See Blockonomi)

Utility Token: A digital token of cryptocurrency that is not an investment but allows access to the product or service of a company (see Hackernoon)

Web 3.0: The next progression in how web based content is created and interacted with, via decentralisation, open source protocols, and the use of AI and Machine Learning (see Lifeboat.com)